Town Square

No settlement in sight with BART 'cooling off' period ending shortly

Original post made
on Sep 24, 2013

The demands by BART's union for a 21 percent raise over three years is simply unaffordable for BART and unreasonable by any measure. In these final days of Gov. Jerry Brown's "cooling off" period, there's still not much to cheer about other than both BART management and unions are talking occasionally.

"BART management says it's reached the end of the road in negotiations. The unions must come to terms with what their employer and riders can afford and offer. If not, with the cooling off period ending Oct. 11, it may be time to start making plans to carpool, change the hours you're needed at your jobs across the Bay or make arrangements to work at home."

Or, better yet, start making plans to leave California so you aren't the last taxpayer standing!

I say "don't renew their contract", hire new people without a union. Unions are out dated, they served their purpose. We have reasonable work hours, benefits, working conditions, safety measures across the states. Thank you unions for getting us on the right road. The problem now is that you are greedy just like the old style of employer that you fought against. Do the right thing for your customers, get onboard or get out of the way.

Posted by Rosalinda
a resident of Danville
on Sep 24, 2013 at 10:15 am

I agree with Morgan and she couldn't have said it better. Thanks unions for the past, but seriously, you are asking for too much. If the union doesn't want to come to a compromise, then BART should replace them with non-union workers. There would be people lined up around the block who would be more than grateful to have one of those cushy jobs.

That's the ticket, folks - Grind 'em down! The only way to be "fair" to private sector workers who have seen their wages and benefits be reduced over time is to drive the private sector workers' wages down ***too***. So what if a 10% raise over 4 years on top of 0% for the last 5 years amounts to a significant wage **cut** in inflation-adjusted dollars? Who do they think they are, trying to get back to what they made in 2008?

I don't see any way we can continue to concentrate wealth among the top 1% unless we keep up the job of whittling away the income of the working class. And since increasing the concentration of wealth at the top seems to be Job 1 these days, why stop at destroying unions? Hey, why not see if we can outsource those jobs? Maybe bring some drivers in from India on those H-2 visas? I figure we won't achieve the economic nirvana sought by the above posters until we have people fighting over jobs that pay worse than garment factories in India. So go get 'em, folks!